A friend of mine has been hinting that I should write something about the topic of paying reparations for slavery. I think it’s time.
This week, Governor Newsom signed into law AB3121 which creates a nine-member task force that will inform Californians about slavery and explore ways the state might provide reparations. But this issue is bigger than California. Democratic lawmakers in Congress have also called for a vote on a bill to study reparations.
First of all, how would you determine who should receive the payments? Clearly not all black people are due reparations. For example, let’s consider a black person who immigrated from Brazil or Jamaica. Both of those countries had their own, rather large, slave trade. I can’t imagine a situation where Americans would be expected to pay reparations for someone whose ancestors were slaves in another country.
How would someone prove they were entitled? Official birth records would be hard to find if they even existed at all. Would the reparations be pro-rated based on when your ancestors were enslaved? Would it make a difference if your ancestors arrived on the continent in the 1600’s or the 1800’s?
What about people who have been trafficked in the sex slave trade? Are those people due reparations any less than someone who had ancestors who were slaves working on a plantation? How about slaves who weren’t black? Is their freedom somehow worth less because of the color of their skin?
Next, let’s move on to who would pay for it? Clearly all Americans can’t be expected to shoulder the burden because not everyone’s ancestors were part of the slave trade. My family came to the U.S. in the 1880’s well after the slaves had been freed. Should I be expected to contribute to the fund? My ancestors lived their entire lives in Minnesota and Iowa, which were Union states. My great-grandparents had no connection to slavery whatsoever. So, I don’t feel that I should be obligated to pay reparations to anyone. And I bet a lot of other people feel the same way.
What about more recent immigrants? Does the length of time someone lives in the country impact how much they’ll need to contribute? Does where someone is from impact the amount they’d have to pay?
Any funds previously collected by the IRS couldn’t be used to pay reparations. Those tax dollars are already spoken for.
There would have to be a new/special tax placed only on those people where it could be proved that their ancestors benefited from the slave trade. Monies collected from that tax would be used to pay reparations. Would people be expected to prove that they were exempt from the “reparation tax” or would the government be required to prove that they should be taxed?
Finally, before someone receives reparations, there would need to be a calculation to determine if that person is actually better off because their ancestors were slaves. It’s quite possible that their lives are much better now than they would have been if their ancestors hadn’t been slaves.
Here are some examples:
- Currently 40% of Nigerians live below the poverty line.
- In the Congo, over 70% of the population lives on less than two bucks per day.
- Nearly 40% of the population of Senegal live in poverty.
Even the poorest of people in the United States would be considered vastly wealthy when compared to poor people living in many African countries.
There is clearly a lot to consider before any reparation plan could be put in place. But, some of these questions are impossible to answer and there is simply no way to implement a program that will be fair to everyone. The whole issue of paying reparations for slavery is simply another example of Democratic politicians pandering to the black community in an attempt to win their votes.
